After having admired Glutenboy's pizzas for so long, I decided to give Glutenboy's dough formulation a try. For my purposes, I scaled the recipe down to a single dough ball size, or around 302 grams for a 14" pizza. Since I don't have any All Trumps or other high-gluten flour on hand, I used King Arthur bread flour (KABF) supplemented with Hodgson Mill vital wheat gluten (VWG) to increase the protein content of the KABF from 12.7% to 14.2%, which is the protein content of the All Trumps high-gluten flour. I used November's Mixed Mass Percentage Calculator at
http://tools.foodsim.com/ to calculate the amount of VWG I would need to create the final blend with a protein content of 14.2%. Since Glutenboy did not indicate what water temperature he used, I used water that came out of the refrigerator and warmed up at room temperature to around 56 degrees F as I was rounding up all of the ingredients to make the dough.
For purposes of coming up with a dough formulation to use, I relied on the ingredients and quantities given by Glutenboy in Reply 5 in this thread, at
http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,7761.msg66669.html#msg66669. Then, using the expanded dough calculating tool at
http://www.pizzamaking.com/expanded_calculator.html, I came up with the following dough formulation:
KABF/VWG Blend* (100%):
Water (61.0526%):
IDY (0.19817%):
Salt (2.5%):
Total (163.75077%):
| 192.95 g | 6.81 oz | 0.43 lbs
117.8 g | 4.16 oz | 0.26 lbs
0.38 g | 0.01 oz | 0 lbs | 0.13 tsp | 0.04 tbsp
4.82 g | 0.17 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.86 tsp | 0.29 tbsp
315.96 g | 11.14 oz | 0.7 lbs | TF = N/A
|
* The KABF/VWG Blend comprises 187.58 g./6.62 oz. KABF and 5.37 g./0.19 oz. Hodgson Mill VWG (1.79 t.)
Note: For a single 14" pizza; bowl residue compensation = 1.5%
I prepared the dough in accordance with Glutenboy's instructions. However, since my KitchenAid stand mixer has a C-hook, I had to intervene in the process from time to time, using my hands and a thin blade spatula, to help the dough mixing/kneading process along. The finished dough weight was 315 grams, which I trimmed back to 302 grams in accordance with Glutenboy's instructions, and the finished dough temperature was 72.5 degrees F. In preparation for placing the dough into my refrigerator and to monitor the expansion of the dough during the fermentation process, I placed two poppy seeds 1" apart at the center of the dough ball, in accordance with the method described at
http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,6914.0.html. The dough ball was placed in a Pyrex glass bowl with a lid. The dough remained in the refrigerator for 8 days. After 2 days, according to the poppy seed spacing, the dough increased by 20%; after 3 days, 42.4%; after 5 days, 95.3%; after 6 days, 126%; after 7 days, 260%; and after 8 days, 297%. I mention these data points because they tell us why Glutenboy's dough can have such a long usable dough life. Simply stated, it is the small amount of yeast (0.19817%) that is used to make the dough, the low water temperature (at least in my case), and the small dough size (302 grams, or 10.65 oz.). It takes almost no time at all for such a small dough ball to cool down once placed into the refrigerator. In my case, after 8 days of cold fermentation, when I decided to use the dough, I found the dough to still have some elasticity as I opened up the dough ball to its final desired size of 14". As a result, I am certain that the dough ball could have lasted at least a few more days in the refrigerator.
I decided to use the dough to make a clam/bacon pizza. I had wanted to use fresh clams but was not able to locate a supply locally without having to drive into Dallas. So, I used a 10-oz. can of whole baby clams. I used the clam juices along with some white wine, extra virgin olive oil, and butter as the base of my sauce. I reduced the liquids until I had a thin sauce and added several diced cloves of garlic, the clams, freshly ground black pepper and a small amount of dried oregano. For the cheese, I used a blend of low-moisture, part-skim mozzarella cheese, NY sharp white cheddar cheese, and Parmigiano-Reggiano Parmesan cheese. The mozzarella and cheddar cheeses were comminuted/diced in my Cuisinart food processor along with the Parmesan cheese and some more dried oregano. The final major topping, the bacon, was partially cooked and cut into good-sized pieces.
The pizza was baked on a pizza stone that had been preheated for an hour. In order to get a stone temperature of around 600 degrees F, which is the temperature that Glutenboy mentioned in this thread, I removed the lowest oven rack position from the oven and placed the stone on three pieces of bricks on the oven floor, which had the effect of bringing the stone closer to the bottom electric heating element. With this arrangement, the stone reached a temperature of close to 600 degrees F. The pizza was baked on the stone for about 6 minutes, following which I removed the pizza from the stone to the topmost oven rack position (without the broiler on) for about a minute more in order to get increased top crust browning.
The photos below show the finished pizza. Both the crust and the pizza itself were first rate. The crust was chewy and crispy but with a fairly soft center outside of the rim area. The crust had good color and taste.
Glutenboy's dough formulation has significant merit. However, as the dough expansion data indicates, the dough is unlikely to be usable after only a few days because of insufficient fermentation. One would have to use more yeast and warmer water to speed up the process.
Peter
EDIT (3/12/13): Corrected the Calculator link
